How safe is VOIP?

sd8974

My aunt recently heard that VOIP is a bit dodgy on the security front, so I said I would look into it for her. I'm sure I have read myself that there are possible issues with how some Voip programs are just a bit too open to the internet at times, and could be vulnerable to attack - is this true? Or should you not really be worrying about this if you have good firewall, anti-virus and anti-spyware protection?

Shane.

MercilessKiller

You shouldn't be worried. Imagine it like sending an msn message from one computer to another.

The local message is split up, encrypted, sent, received, decrypted and then viewed. Its basically exactly the same with VOIP except audio data instead of text. You should already have good firewall/virsu scanner, thus there aren't any major security vunrabilities that a home user should worry about.

Hope i helped

redux

Skype is not liked by companies' IT departments for security reasons

MercilessKiller

redux wrote:

Skype is not liked by companies' IT departments for security reasons

Even if there was a massiv security issue, skype would overcome it.

business' may not like it... but millions of home users use it without any problems Its prob bandwidth that companie's are worried about hhaa

Darksun

MercilessKiller wrote:

You shouldn't be worried. Imagine it like sending an msn message from one computer to another.

Well actually, when you send a message over MSNM, it first goes to a server run by MSN, which relays it to the recepient(s). Skype is a peer to peer service.

MercilessKiller

Darksun wrote:

Well actually, when you send a message over MSNM, it first goes to a server run by MSN, which relays it to the recepient(s). Skype is a peer to peer service.

I was meaning the encryption...but ye your right

MSN = comp ---> server ---> comp
Skype = comp ---> comp

BUT the encryption on the data will mean that the information can't be accessed remotely by another computer.. only a local one by sniffing over a network, which is detectable on business networks and no worry for home users really...

So ye safety = no issue really

zappahey

MercilessKiller wrote:

BUT the encryption on the data will mean that the information can't be accessed remotely by another computer.. only a local one by sniffing over a network, which is detectable on business networks and no worry for home users really...

How does this local sniffing computer decrypt the packets, surely they're encrypted before they leave the back of your PC?

The bigger issue for business is that Skype makes a great effort to circumvent security systems like firewalls, etc. It can then pose an uncontrolled and unmanaged route into corporate networks if a vulnerability is exploited.